Today in Texas, Bellator finally announced what we've known for quite a while now: Bellator will be running professional kickboxing shows. The first event will be piggybacked onto the Oktagon/Bellator event in Italy, much like we've speculated. The names that Coker introduced at the press event today were Kevin Ross, Joe Schilling, Keri Melendez, Raymond Daniels and Anastasia Yankova. These will most likely be the banner fighters for the promotion moving forward.

Many have noted that Schilling is fighting on the upcoming GLORY card, but there have been some weird contractual issues between Schilling and GLORY, I wouldn't be shocked if this was simply finishing things out.

Carlo di Blasi was there to discuss rules, regulations and promotional impact worldwide. This event will air immediately after the Bellator event does, meaning that Spike and Bellator are putting their all into making this event seem huge.

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So this is finally happening. After almost a year of rumors and false starts, Scott Coker's kickboxing organization is finally happening.

There’s a belief in the fight community that when you go to Japan that you need to be prepared for anything. You could say that for any fighter going into another country where they are to fight local fighters they have their backs against the wall and fear the “hometown decision,” but in Japan it always seems amplified. A part of that is the marriage of professional wrestling and professional fighting that has existed for a very long time in the world of “kakutougi.”

In fact, if you were to look at Shoot Boxing’s S-Cup event there was a professional wrestling bout on the card featuring New Japan Pro Wrestling Junior Heavyweight sensation Kota Ibushi against former DDT Pro Wrestling colleague Michael Nakazawa. It was originally labeled as an “exhibition match” under Shoot Boxing rules and was scheduled to be against Kazushi Sakuraba, but that fell through thanks to Metamoris 5.

That should set the tone for you.

This S-Cup was one of the few that I’ve seen more than the usual fans excited over, which was in part due to the card that they put together. Mosab Amrani, Pornasae, Hiroaki Suzuki, Michiko Omigawa, Hiroki Shishido and American Muay Thai fighter Kevin Ross were all a part of the tournament, while legend Andy Souwer and Shoot Boxing hero RENA were in Super Fights.

It felt like one of the bigger shows that Shoot Boxing had put on in a very, very long time and then Shoot Boxing went and put on a shameful display for all of the world to see.

The draw for American fans was muay thai standout Kevin Ross being in the tournament. Ross went into the tournament against his toughest test by the way of former Sengoku, DREAM and UFC alumnus Michihiro Omigawa. Omigawa was a champion Judoka who rose to prominence in the Japanese MMA scene and after his UFC stint gave a shot at Shoot Boxing. Much like Toby Imada in the past, his grappling skills were able to help him against seasoned kickboxers and 2014 was his second attempt at Shoot Boxing gold.

By all accounts Omigawa was winning the first round handily thanks to his throws, which score heavily under Shoot Boxing rules, but there was a clash of heads that led to a nasty cut on Omigawa's face. In the second round the cut was a major factor, leading the ref to stopping the bout. The referee awarded the fight in favor of Ross due to the stoppage, while backstage there was a different story and Shoot Boxing organizers informed Ross that the fight was being rendered a No Contest and that he would not continue on in the tournament.

The rules are a bit unclear at a time like this, where it isn’t clear who was at fault, or if it was accidental. What the referee most likely saw and ruled was that the cut was due to Omigawa’s own “negligence” (section 10) and ruled it in favor of Ross. Shoot Boxing might have been arguing that it was due to both men, which would make things a lot muddier. The truth of the matter is, the referee awarded Ross the win in the ring and any time the decision is reversed backstage it will be a tough sell to anyone that it was on the up-and-up.

If that wasn’t frustrating enough, then there is the story of Zakaria Zouggari. Don’t know who Zakaria Zouggari is? Neither did we, but we sure as hell know now. Rob Emerson of MMA fame (fame?!) was scheduled to take part, but at the last minute was unable to secure a visa, which left Shoot Boxing in a bind and called up relative unknown Zakaria Zouggari to fill in for Emerson in a reserve bout.

Zouggari defeated Shoot Boxing’s resident punching bag Bovy Sor. Udomson via cut stoppage in round two and, thanks to the Kevin Ross/Omigawa shenanigans, was called upon to fight in the tournament moving forward.

That led to a fight with internationally-renowned Houcine Bennoui and for this amazing display.

Seriously. God damn.

So this unknown would move onto the finals. According to Andy Souwer after the event Zouggari literally got off of the plane, dropped his bag off in his hotel room then hopped on a bus and headed to the event without time to rest, eat or get acclimated. This was the man who went on to the finals against 2013 65kg S-Cup Champion Hiroaki Suzuki. This is where things went from bad to worse. Zouggari clearly had the fight won after three rounds, only for an extension round to be ordered. When that was too close a SECOND extension round happened where Suzuki was finally able to score a TKO over Zouggari and it looked like Shoot Boxing’s hand-picked champion had won again.

It was almost like they weren't trying to hide the favoritism and that they really, really wanted Suzuki vs. Omigawa in a rematch of last year's finals.

Okay, so the S-cup is on this weekend, it starts on Sunday at 13:00 in Japan which is Saturday at 23:00 EST or 20:00 PST. Finally it's at a decent hour for us to watch, except to order it we have to decode NicoNico tv and most of us here in North America cannot read Japanese. The difference this time is that Kevin Ross in taking part who is American which will make more of us want to watch.

The easiest way to do this is use Google chrome and use the translate button (right beside the favourties star) to just translate the site one page at a time, But we have also decided to to a step by step for people that need a little help.

- Step 5 - A box will come up that says you dont have enough points once again click the red/pink button and it will take you to a terms and conditions page, Scroll down and click the Yellow Button at the bottom and you will be at this page.

This page is asking how many points you want to buy, the shootboxing event is either 1300 or 1500 so u will need to click on 2000, which costs 2000 Yen, which is 16.99 USD.

- Step 5 - once you have clicked the 2000 you will be at this page where it asks to click all sorts of payment methods that we don't know, just scroll down to the Visa one

One more screen will pop up confirming the 2000 points for 2000 Yen, just click the yellow button and transaction is complete. Now you have the points on your account u can go back to the first Link https://secure.live.nicovideo.jp/event/shootboxing and click red button to buy the ticket and it should go through nicely. If the you preorder the fights it costs 1300 Yen, if u wait its 1500 Yen.

Since K-1's event last December in China there has been a lot of hushed talk about the future of K-1 in China. The year 2014 has been a lot better to K-1 than other years and there have been a lot of deals talked about that could possibly make K-1 not only a major player in China, but huge in China. From what we've seen, K-1 has been training referees, judges and other officials on top of lending a hand to train fighters in China over the last year and on January 1st K-1 will make their return to China with a huge USA vs. China event.

It'll take place in Golden Eagle Culture City, Changsua, China and as I stated before, the theme will be USA vs. China. While we don't know all of the names just yet, we have heard that Kevin Ross has signed to be the Team Captain of Team USA and will be fighting, which is pretty big news considering that Ross was being courted by K-1 years ago and GLORY last year only for nothing to come of it. We've also been told that Canadian Gabriel Varga is scheduled to appear on the card, which is interesting considering there was talk of him competing for GLORY's Featherweight Championship soon.

There have been a number of smaller Muay Thai stories making the rounds lately that we haven't had a chance to mention, so for you fans of the science of eight limbs, here are some of the latest rumblings, all collected together.

-First up, a result from this past weekend direct from Thailand. One of the big events this year has been the ongoing Isuzu Thai Fight qualifying tournament at Omnoi Stadium. That tournament is nearing completion, as the first of the two semi-finals went down this past Saturday. In semi-final #1, it was Nopparet Keatkhamtorn vs. Dernchonlek Sor. Niyom. Check the full entry for the complete fight, and if you don't want the result spoiled, stop reading this paragraph now. The semi-final clash was a good, if slightly odd fight at times, with Nopparet seeming to show some irritation throughout. As the fight progressed, Dernchonlek looked to control the clinch for the win, but it wasn't enough as Nopparet took the decision win. He now moves onto the finals to face the winner of Khem Sitsongpeenong vs. Prakaisaeng Sit O on April 16.

-We previously reported on the May 14 Thai Fight Extreme card, and now we have some more details. Coming from France, this is the event featuring a stacked line-up including Buakaw, Yodsaenklai, Saiyok, and more. A tentative card has been released, and it looks like they are going with a Thailand vs. France theme. The current line-up:

Saiyok Pumpanmuang vs. Mohamed Diaby

Sudsakon Sor Klinmee vs. Abdallah Mabel

Yodsaenklai Fairtex vs. Jose Barradas

Buakaw Por Pramuk vs. Djime Coulibaly

Petasawin Seatransferry vs. Sofian Dergada

Yuya Yamato vs. Fabio Pinca

Hiroki Komata vs. Samir Mohamed

Hiroki Yamamoto vs. Ibrahim Chiahou

Not a huge challenge for either Yod or Buakaw, but both Sudsakorn vs. Mabel and Saiyok vs. Diaby should be good fights.

-Another upcoming fight for Buakaw could be his planned appearance in the US at the August 13 Stand Up Promotions event in Anaheim, CA. Seeing the K-1 MAX legend is reason enough to be excited for this card, but they've now added a huge fight that should draw you in. On August 13 it will be pound for pound Muay Thai king Saenchai Sinbi (that's the former Saenchai Sor Kingstar, now relocated to Sinbi gym) vs. American Muay Thai stand-out Kevin Ross. This is an amazing score for the promotion, as this will mark the first time an American challenges Saenchai here in the US. There's great stuff going on in the west coast Muay Thai scene these days, and this match just shows how alive that scene is. Also discussed for that card are Kaoklai and Saiyok.

-Speaking of Saenchai, just a reminder that he is in action this weekend, facing Liam Harrison on the 9th at Duel at the Dome in the UK.

-Finally, one more US fight rumor - on May 14 Lion Fight Promotions will host Battle in the Desert 2. Rumors now indicate that the show may feature former It's Showtime and King's Cup champion Cosmo Alexandre against Cyrus Washington. Once again, this would be a great chance to see a top international Muay Thai name here in the US.

The ability to overcome adversity is what can make or break a fighter and take them from being just a fighter to a legend. In the case of American Muay Thai fighter Kevin Ross, the adversity has never been his skill, abilities or drive, but instead an ACL injury that he suffered last year. He spent months rehabbing it after surgery and everything was built up for his comeback fight this January at Lion Fight 8. We spoke with Kevin back then about his comeback trail as well as the details of what he goes through in his personal life, what actually makes Kevin Ross tick and we were all treated to seeing Kevin’s successful comeback against Chris Kwiatowski.

It was the first step of many for Ross after coming back from an injury that would have stopped most fighters in the prime of their career and this Friday, live on AXS TV, Ross looks to once again enter the ring and take on a very game opponent in the UK’s Bernie Mendietta. Part of his last fight was not knowing exactly what Chris would bring to the table, and in the case of Mendietta he expects the same.

“I think that I know less about him than I did Chris,” he joked. “I’ve just really seen clips at this point, where with Chris I had at least seen a full fight or two. I know that he’s a tough guy, though, I know that he likes to brawl, so I know what I’m in for.”

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Ross is one of the few modern Western fighters who has jumped right into the deep end in the past with some of Thailand’s best. His “home” in Thailand is the Sitmonchai Gym, which served as a kicking off point for Ross’s training camp for this fight, but it served to be a remnant of his painful injury from last year just as well.

“Yeah, I went back to Thailand and trained at Sitmonchai,” he stated, before continuing. “But you know, it wasn’t really planned or anything. I had this plane ticket to Thailand from last year that I didn’t get to use because of my injury and all. So I had this plane ticket that was worth $1,300 and it was about to expire, so I had to use it now. I did my first two weeks of my training camp out there, which was a good way to start things out.”

It is also no secret that Ross has been looking to fight in Kickboxing fights as well, with a contract signed with Glory. There was a false start involved with Glory with them announcing him as a participant in an upcoming May tournament, only for them to retract it right after. The story behind it is quite fascinating and shows how differently the fight game can work overseas for some fighters.

“Well, they never talked to me about it,” he laughed, remembering back to the day that it was announced. “I had people congratulating me and telling me that they were going to book tickets to Japan to see me fight over there and I had no idea what was going on. I have a contract with Lion Fight and a fight scheduled in May for them, so my manager got on the phone with them to explain that they had to work around that contract, you know, work together. I think that they understand now, but we still don’t have anything officially planned yet.”

As for that fight in May with Lion Fight, Ross was blunt with who he wanted to fight and who they were working on getting for him; “Matt Embree,” he said. Matt Embree, the Muay Thai standout from Canada, also known as one of the best in North America. It makes for a great matchup between the two, but don’t look for it just yet. “Nothing is signed yet,” he cautioned. “It’s still in the works, but that is the plan for right now.”

This would be his third fight in five months, which is a daunting task for any fighter, never mind one coming back from such a debilitating injury, but Ross seemed ready to go. “I’ve tried planning vacations before and I just get bored,” he said. “This next fight gives me 10 weeks so I might take a week or two off from the gym,” he joked. “But I took a month off once -- I forced myself to, actually -- and when I got back to the gym just everything hurt more, everything was a challenge.”

There is something unique about fighting in Lion Fight for Kevin and that is that the promotion is also home to many of his friends and quasi-teammates from Can’t Stop Crazy. This upcoming card features Tiffany Van Soest as well as his good friend Joe Schilling in fights and one has to wonder what kind of impact it has on a fighter to have friends competing on the same card.

“It’s definitely not weird,” he laughed. “It’s really kind of cool as we can all pump each other up and it’s easy to get excited because you have friends competing on the same card. It can be tough if one of them loses, though, or gets hurt. You know, it is a lot easier if you fight first and then the pressure is off and you can just watch them.”

When we last talked with Kevin, we talked about how he has come to a role of prominence in American Muay Thai and how there are people that look up to him and look to him to be America’s great muay thai hope and with him fighting on AXS TV now, it seems like it has only gotten bigger.

“Oh yeah, I’ve definitely noticed a change,” he noted. “It’s on a national network and, you know, one that people actually get. This isn’t ESPN 8 or something like that, this is a network that most people get. It isn’t global or anything, but people in the United States are seeing these fights and it is becoming a big deal.”

His role as America’s muay thai hero has also allowed him to help out and give back, as he has recently been the face of K-Hero’s FIGHT CANCER campaign. Brent Magnussen of K-Hero lost his mother to cancer and decided to use the K-Hero brand to help give back to the community and to raise money, choosing his friend Kevin Ross to help out. “I’ve known Brent for a while, trained with him and everything. So he asked me and this was a good cause and he’s a good friend. He said that he’d sponsor me, make my walkout shirts and everything, but I’d do it even if they weren’t sponsoring me, either. I like to give back.”

Ross fights on the same weekend that NIck Diaz gets his shot against GSP, with Nick Diaz known to do part of his training camps down at CSA Gym where Kevin calls his home. It was too hard to resist asking Kevin about Nick. “Nick?” He laughed, the inflection in his voice changing. “You want to know about Nick? Oh man. You know, he’s a great guy, not at all what people make him out to be. He’s a lot like Joe [Schilling] where people see what they want to see, they see this badboy and whatever, but Nick is a great guy. He’s super respectful. He actually called me ‘sir’ for the longest time, which just blew my mind. Nick is just an easy-going guy, real easy to like and he likes most people. Well, unless he doesn’t like you and then you’ll know, he let’s you know right away that he doesn’t like you. He’s a great guy and a great fighter.”

Ross steps into the ring for the second time since his injury last year this Friday at Lion Fight 9 in Las Vegas. The fight will air live on AXS TV at 10pm Eastern Time and as Ross noted to us, the card is just absolutely stacked full of great fights. So much so that he couldn’t pick which fight he wanted to watch the most. It is that good.

Perhaps the thing that caught my eye the most about the early leaks for the inaugural Bellator Kickboxing card was some of the names included. Sure, Melvin Manhoef makes a lot of sense, considering he’s signed to Bellator for MMA already, but it was the names Denise Kielholtz, Raymond Daniels and Kevin Ross that really caught my eye. All three were stars in other promotions before; Kielholtz in Enfusion Live, Daniels in GLORY and Ross in Lion Fight. While Daniels departing GLORY came as a bit of a shock, Kevin Ross signing with Bellator Kickboxing was the real surprise.

Kevin Ross is perhaps the poster boy for muay thai in the United States, to the point where Ross himself is sort of a meme. Seriously, Ross is sort of a meme for this photo of him bowing, fists extended towards the camera with the words “muay thai” scrawled across his knuckles. Chances are that you’ve seen that photo before, even if you aren’t super into kickboxing or muay thai. Regardless, Ross made his name among hardcore fans as a tough-as-nails American nak muay who wasn’t afraid to fly over to Thailand and scrap with the best of them or to sign on to face top level Thais in his home of California. The list of Thai opponents stretches from Coke Chunhawat to Malaipet, Sagetdao and even, yes, one of the greatest of all time in Saenchai.

The Famous Photo of Ross

Win, lose or draw (Ross actually has zero draws to his credit) Ross is always looking to entertain. “I’m there to put on a show for the fans,” he explained to me. “I put everything into my fights, I’m never taking it easy or trying to just hold on, I’m always doing my best even if it means losing.” This is the Kevin Ross that endeared himself to a larger audience thanks to Lion Fight’s television deal with AXS TV that saw Ross as one of Lion Fight’s centerpieces for so long. Much like Ross explained, he entertained in each and every outing with Lion Fight, which is what made the fact that Lion Fight somehow let him go all the more insane. Who let’s a guy like that go?

Bellator’s Scott Coker made a deal that Ross simply couldn’t resist. “What’s important to me is staying active, being able to go anywhere and fight anyone if I have downtime. That’s what they offered me. Of course, Bellator is my home base and takes priority, but part of my deal is that I can take outside fights.” If you’ve never spoken to Kevin before he’s an incredibly nice guy, always easy to talk with. I joked with him about how he had multiple fight offers in China, only for those to fall apart due to his contractual obligations and exclusivity. “Yeah, exactly,” he said. “I can take outside fights now. If you are gonna keep me under lock and key at least keep me active. Fighting once or twice a year just isn’t enough.”

As I mentioned above, Ross is best known for muay thai. In fact, if you talk to Ross he’ll express his love and passion for the sport, but kickboxing has been on his agenda for a while now. Ross has had multiple false starts when it comes to kickboxing, from being booked with K-1 in China to GLORY announcing that they signed Ross only for Lion Fight to impose their will and keep Ross from fighting there. I’ve always seen Ross as sort of a ride-or-die guy for muay thai, but he brushed that off.

“Muay thai is my passion,” he explained, “but I’ve always loved kickboxing as well. I’ve always been a fan of it and it’s a really good fit for me. I can’t throw elbows or anything, but that’s okay.” His style actually adapts incredibly well to kickboxing. Ross has a fluid style that relies a bit heavier on range than your average muay thai fighter. Sure, kickboxing lacks the clinch or the elbows, but that also means we probably won’t have that many more Kevin Ross bloodbaths, which got a laugh out of him. “Yeah, I’m comfortable with kickboxing, for sure. You’ll see the same Kevin Ross that you always see, I’m gonna be fighting my heart out as always.”

And fight he will, because on April 16th he’s schedule against Matteo Taccini, whom we both admitted to not exactly know a ton about. “I know that he’s young, I know that he’s hungry and for me this isn’t anything different. I’m prepared to be myself and to fight like I always do, whatever he brings to the table I’ll be prepared for. It’s gonna be a fun fight.”

The future's looking bright for Ross, who admits that he’s been fighting for over 13 years now. The inevitable question was that now that he’s under contract to Bellator would he consider MMA, something that he had considered for a long time in the past, but was able to avoid. The answer was pretty simple. “If I was going to do it, I would have done it already, you know? For a long time I thought that I was going to, I was getting ready for it. Never say never, I guess? But probably not.” We had agreed that it makes a bigger statement for him to stay where he is, and according to Ross he’s already see the flow move towards kickboxing and muay thai thanks to the popularity of Glory and Lion Fight. “I’m already seeing fighters trying to make their way in kickboxing, choosing it over MMA, I think that you’ll see more of that in the future.”

When I brought up the topic of if MMA and kickboxing needed to be connected closely for kickboxing and muay thai to grow, or if it was detrimental he was optimistic in it finding its own audience as well as appealing to fight fans in general. “It’s a little of both, I think. I don’t think that being closely related to MMA will be a bad thing for it, or that anyone will look down on it. I think that people will realize that it’s different and that it’ll come into its own. I’m just happy that I get to be a part of it and to help move the sport forward still.”

The decision that Ross made to jump to Bellator Kickboxing is a huge one for the sport, with Ross being incredibly upbeat heading into his first fight for the organization and clearly holds Scott Coker and his past accomplishments within kickboxing and MMA in high regards. “I mean, it’s Scott Coker,” he said, “his track record speaks for itself. Nobody has more experience doing what he’s done and how he’s done it, I’m looking forward to seeing how it pans out and I’m honored to be an important part of it. He’s got the right fighters, the right team and the right network in Spike TV in place to help to make this a success.”

Indeed, Scott Coker made his mark on kickboxing a great deal of years ago with his own events before he took the reins of K-1 USA and before Strikeforce transitioned to MMA and took the world by storm. On April 16th (airing on April 22nd on Spike TV) we’ll see the vision start to fall into place with Kevin Ross at the forefront against Matteo Taccini.

If you follow Muay Thai in America, you know the name Kevin Ross. Hell, if you follow Muay Thai in general, you know Kevin Ross. Ross is one of the few American fighters over the past few years to really move outside of his comfort zone and go to Thailand and fight some of the best in the world. He has long been considered one of the best Thai fighters to come out of the US by fans and is set to make his return to the ring this Saturday night at Lion Fight 8 live on AXS TV.

Kevin is coming off of a pretty bad ACL injury that required surgery and months of rehabilitation that left him out of action for all of 2012, but that all ends this Saturday night as he squares off against Chris Kwiatkowski. LiverKick's Dave Walsh caught up with Kevin to discuss this fight, his rehabilitation and a whole lot more.

LK: So obviously it has been a while since you’ve fought, what have you missed the most when it comes to fighting?

KR: I mean, I’ve missed it all. Right after surgery I was in there on one leg punching the bag. I couldn’t stay away, man, I’d start getting depressed, like this is what I love to do, you know? Like the number one passion in my life and to be away from it for any period of time is just impossible. Especially the fighting. The fighting is like the peak of the sport, you know, with what I love to do it is the very top of that. To be away for as long as I have been, it’s been really hard. Even if it’s a month or two, I want to be in the ring. It’s been what, 15 months? It’s been rough.

LK: The ACL injury that you are recovering from could mean the end of a career for some fighters, but you seem to be healing up pretty well from it. What kind of obstacles did you have to overcome to heal up from the injury and the surgery?

KR: There’s a list! In the beginning one of the biggest hurdles I had to overcome was there was all of this scar tissue in my knee. We couldn’t get to the actual rehabilitation until they could get all of that broken up so I could bend my knee back all the way. The first few weeks were some of the most painful things I’ve had to go through in my life, I was like punching holes in the wall, man. Every time I went in there to rehab they had to break up the scar tissue and like smash my leg back down trying to get it to bed all of the way back. That was one of the hardest things. You know, not knowing if I was going to be able to make it back.

There were some days when I really was like, “I don’t know if I can do this anymore.” I knew that I could walk right now, but didn’t know if I could make it back. As soon as I was able to start training again I would look at all of the videos of my training that I did for my old fights, and was like damn dude, I don’t know if I can do that again. While I’m happy to be healthy and all of that, at the same time you realize how hard the sport is. You forget all of the stuff that you have to do. The ups and downs and stuff, you get kind of mixed feelings about it, but they are all temporary things. This is what I love to do and that is what got me through.

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LK: An ACL is a pretty serious injury, was there actually a while where you thought that you couldn’t come back?

KR: There wasn’t really a time where I was like, “I can’t do this.” Eh, you know, there were these moments where it popped into my head like, “this is just too hard.” Not for any extended period of time, though. There were moments where I doubted that I’d be able to do this at a high level again, sure. I knew I could get back to fighting, fighting sure, but where I was before? That was a big one. You know, not knowing how long it would actually take. You know, for me, I want to be like the fastest healer ever, faster than anyone else has ever done it. Yet at the same time, not over do it and re-injure myself. Find that balance between the two. It always felt like everyone was telling me how amazing it was how fast I was healing, but one little misstep or one day where I didn’t improve it made me think what if this took like two-three years. That was real difficult, man.

Any little thing and you’d wonder if it was re-injured. It’s not like you can see inside of your knee, you know? And like I’d think back to when I originally got injured. All of the doctors told me that I was fine and there was nothing wrong with it. So I functioned on it and trained on it for four weeks while it was completely torn. Any time I had something happen, or a pain in my knee, it would cross my mind that my knee was blown out again and I was thinking, “how could I go through this again?” I don’t know if I could, man.

Come back from that twice? That’d be rough.

LK: Chris Kwiatkowski is a tough guy and like you, had kind of a late start in muay thai but hasn’t seen the same deal of success. There is kind of this whole East Coast Muay Thai scene and West Coast Muay Thai scene and he is one of the East Coast guys and you one of the West Coast guys. Did you have a hand in picking who you fought?

KR: They asked me who I wanted to fight and I gave them a list of three or four guys who agreed to fight me, and when it came time to sign on the dotted line they were nowhere to be found and backed out. That was pretty hard for me. We had this guy for me and everything was great, then he backed out, then again another one backed out, then another one backed out. I did all of this work to come back and now no one wants to fight me? If there ever was going to be a time to want to fight me, now is that time. I can’t believe that guys who said they wanted to fight me won’t fight me now when I’m coming off an an injury.

So I was like, who am I going to fight? Am I going to have to go in there and fight some of the top guys again in my first fight back? I was like screw it, let’s do it, but there were a few more options, Chris being one of him, along with a few others. So I said yeah him, any of these guys are cool, so they had some interest in fighting me and he just ended up being the guy that it ended up being. I had never heard of him, but other than that I definitely didn’t know who he was.

LK: A lot of fighters would look at your 2011 and just look at the numbers and say it wasn’t a good year, I disagree. You fought some of the very best in the world and held your own and have been the great American hope for Muay Thai, is that a lot, if not too much pressure, or are you alright with it?

KR: I’ve never kind of looked at myself as this whatever, posterboy, or whatever. I just want to be me and be the best me ever. I’ve always been someone that performs better under pressure. But yeah, I mean, if people want to look at me and say that’s me, that will definietly inspire me to do much more. I’ve never felt that I’m that guy, but then again, I’ve never seen myself as perhaps other people do, like this great American Muay Thai fighter. I’m just me, just trying to do my best. I might be at a higher level than most of the others, but I’m just trying to do the same thing that a guy at his first smoker is trying to do, I’m just trying to fight the best that I can and do the best that I can in this sport. I just happened to get here. I’m just trying to do my best, be the best that I can.

Be the best role model that the sport that I can be, because I am in this position. It definitely weighs on my mind. I’ve never really looked at myself that way, but I realize that other people do and I consciously have to think about that and try even more so to do my best.

LK: Lion Fight seems to be the most successful at promoting Muay Thai on a bigger level in the United States. I know we’ve all kind of talked about this before, but what do you see Muay Thai needing to get over that hump and become more popular.

KR: It can definitely get bigger. I think that there is a strong need and want for it. I think one of the biggest things is that it hasn’t been on TV and gotten that exposure. It’s been on some local channels and that kind of stuff, but to get a good Muay Thai card on live TV that’s a huge thing, a huge step in this sport. It’s something that’s been in the works for I don’t know, 20 years, forever? The fact that Lion Fight is doing it and they are doing it right lately. They are building up the local fighters, building up the mid-level fighters, bringing in some international talent to top off the card, as opposed to making some mega ultra show where they blow all of their money and nobody sees it. It’s like, people don’t care about that. I mean, most people, most Americans, they don’t even know these people, they’d rather go and see people from their hometown.

I don’t know why you’d waste all of this money when all that people care about are the fighters that they know, so it finally seems like someone is doing it right. Lion Fights’ last few cards have been great, the amateur cards have been great, the pro cards have been great, it’s all at the right level. It’s all about the matchups. I don’t care if its the pro card or the amateur card, it’s about putting the right fights on. You could have the two best fighters in the world, but if it’s a bad matchup nobody wants to see it, they want to see the best fights. Just having a name isn’t always the most important thing. Especially in Mauy Thai, they don’t know any of these fighters, they want to see guys get beaten up and you know see good technique and a good solid fight, which is important. This is what Lion Fight is doing, especially this next card, it’s stacked. It’s stacked with great fights, whether it’s on the amateur card or the undercard or the pro card. All of the fights are gonna be great and the fact that it’s gonna be on TV? That’s a great first step, man. I really hope and I believe that things will really start picking up from here or at least progress from here.

LK: You recently signed to Glory, and I know we’ve talked about you possibly doing Kickboxing before, but how different do you think it’ll be preparing for a Kickboxing fight instead of a Muay Thai fight?

KR: It doesn’t bother me man, like muay thai is my love, but my next love is fighting. I’ve fought in just Kickboxing rules before and I’m fine with it. My style is fine for it, anyway. I like to elbow people and knee people, too, but I have a very good style to transition over to just hands and kicks. I’ve done it before and I’m pretty confident in myself that I can do very well within those rules, especially for me as opposed to other people who rely on the rules in Muay Thai moreso. I’m pretty confident in my abilities, especially my boxing and my kicks. It’s perfect for me. You know, I’d love to elbow people all day, but if it’s gotta be something, I’d rather it be that.

LK: I know you follow Muay Thai pretty closely, but do you follow Kickboxing as well?

KR: I mean, I just love watching fights. I’ll watch fights all day everyday. Most of the time I’m watching old school Thai fights, but I’ll watch any fights that I can get my hands on.

LK: Is there anyone in particular in Kickboxing that you’d want to fight?

KR: Yeah, I mean, most of the guys that I want to fight I’d prefer to fight in Muay Thai rules, but I’d fight all of those same people in Kickboxing. I’d rather fight these guys when we have all of our weapons at our disposal instead of being limited, but I think in most cases that style would favor me as opposed to them. Where as Muay Thai helps level it out, more so in their favor.

LK: A lot of guys who fight muay thai end up training for MMA as well. Joe Schilling is currently doing that and it seems like you are just a muay thai guy through and through, would you ever consider making that jump?

KR: Yeah, it was something I was kind of playing around with the idea of back in around 2008. I was seriously considering switching over. I was having a really hard time getting fights, and things were falling through, I wasn’t making any money. As long as I’m fighting I’m happy, but when I’m not fighting and not making money, both, I’d rather, I’ll go box if I have to. You know, I’ve dabbled in a little bit of everything just to get that experience in the ring because I love to fight no matter what it is. Muay Thai is my passion, though.

You know, with me, though, if I’m going to switch over into another sport I’m going to do it 100%, I don’t want to kind of be half-assed at two different things. Kind of good at Muay Thai and kind of good at MMA. If I’m gonna do it, I’m gonna do it, completely switch over. At the end of 2008 I made a New Year’s resolution that I was going to give Muay Thai one more year, not going to think about anything else and just focus on that and see where it goes. If by the end of the year they aren’t where I want them to be then I’ll switch. Then about a week after New Year’s I got a call to fight for my first WBC Title and you know all of these fights started picking up, stuff like title shots. Things really took off from there, so at this point? No, I’m definitely not going to do it at this stage of my career, there is really no reason to. When I was kind of in the middle working my way up it kind of seemed more likely, but at this point? No. I’ve done too much in this sport to quit now. I wouldn’t say that it’s impossible that one day I’m gonna do MMA, but it won’t be any time soon. Maybe when I’m done doing Muay Thai and I’ve got nothing else left to do.

LK: Can’t Stop Crazy is this group of really super talented fighters based in the US and isn’t a traditional fight team or anything, but just a collective of some of the best. Who came up with the idea and got the ball rolling on it?

KR: I’ll put that on Joe. He used to say that it was my idea, but it definitely wasn’t my idea. I might have been there during the conceptualization of it, but it wasn’t my idea at all. I give that all to him. I think that we were always just talking that we really needed to band together, like obviously this isn’t like a fighter’s union, but it’s obvious that we are all working together. We are all kind of close and we all train together once in a while, some of us are real good friends, so we decided to get together, to start this crew up and try to help each other out as best we can. Give ourselves an outlet for our media, for our interviews and stuff. I think that we were just getting fed up with some of the sites doing stuff with misquoting, some of them printing stuff that never happened and showing this favoritism for certain guys when things were looking good and then when things are looking bad, well, that’s the media for you, that’s just how it works. We wanted something to put ourselves out here because it has our stamp on it, you know we said it if we put it out there.

That’s kind of how it started, then you know, we designed a few shirts and it just kind of picked up from there and it is what it is. People ask me all of the time what to call it and I don’t know, it’s just us.

LK: You are a pretty awesome artist, do you ever feel like fighting gets in the way of your ability to draw and stuff like that? Does the thought of breaking your hand and not being able to draw or paint ever creep into your mind?

KR: Yeah, well which I have done a few times actually. It does, it really does. Art is just something that I’ve always done my whole life, where Muay Thai is actually my passion. I definitely couldn’t compare the two, but art is definitely my second passion. You know, I think about it, whether I’ll be able to keep doing it and fighting definitely takes away from it because it’s hard for me to focus on both. After fights I’ll definitely try to focus on it and get some stuff done here and there, but yeah, art was kind of just something that I did, like I knew that I could do it forever, that’s why I went to school for computer animation. You know, animation wasn’t really a passion of mine, but it was more, how am I going to make money with art? So here’s something you can do and you can make some decent money, but then, two years into school is when I started training, and I really didn’t want to bother with school anymore, but I finished that.

But yeah, it’s just another kind of outlet of my creativity. I can only fight for so long and I’ll always have some part in the sport if it’s coaching or training or whatever, but art is always going to be there, too. You know, if I mangle my hand beyond recognition I’ll have to figure something out.

LK: Did anyone do any write-ins to vote for El Presidente this election season that you know of?

KR: A few people did, actually and they sent them to me, actually. It was pretty funny. That is another thing, I don’t even know where that came from or who started it. I don’t even know. People ask me and I don’t know what the hell it is, I guess it’s just me, man. Stuff like that just happens and people want to know where it came from and you’re asking the wrong person. It just happens while you’re training and you know, I had the whole shirt and people dig it, they call me that everywhere that I go.

LK: So what comes after this fight this week? You have actual contracts with Lion Fight and Glory this time around, which makes your life a bit easier I assume.

KR: Yeah, it will be a little too easy, actually. I’m not even gonna get any breaks, man. Maybe I should have taken some time off after the surgery, like I’ve taken no time off. I was literally in the gym one week after the surgery and I’ve taken no breaks. Now I’ll have like a week off after this, but nothing’s signed. I believe that I’m gonna be on the next Lion Fight fight which is in March, which is like seven weeks after this one. Then I believe that Glory has an event in Italy in April and that I might be on that one. So it’s going to be back-to-back-to-back, and that is how it always has been. When it rains it pours, like I’ll have droughts and then like 3 - 4 fights in a month just back-to-back-to-back.

You gotta take advantage of it while you can, because you never know when there won’t be fights. Even though I’d like a break, even a little vacation, I’m really happy to have these opportunities and not have to go searching and scrounging for fights.

Last night at Foxwoords Resort and Casino in Connecticut Lion Fight made their East Coast debut with Lion Fight 15. It was an exciting night of action that saw Lion Fight standouts Kevin Ross and Tiffany Van Soest back in the winners column. The main event saw Muay Thai sensation Cosmo Alexandre score a unanimous decision victory over Mark Holst.